not-your-average-url

[not-your-average-url]

Reading system collapse be like

[not-your-average-url]

Kevin R Free you beautiful bastard. There’s a scene in system collapse where murderbot and art are talking in the medbay after REDACTED and murderbot is trying to put into words how it feels and fuckkk. Kevin did not have to go this hard. The line is “something in me broke” and the delivery is fucking incredible. There’s a voice crack and the desperation and helplessness. The jump between the relatively calm mental voice to the devastation in its speaking voice is so visceral. That one line delivery made me cry. (Minute 28 of chapter 6 if you wanna listen)

Everyone say thank you Kevin

[not-your-average-url]

Stopppp it’s so funny. Reading system collapse again and there’s a scene where they’re trying to find the colony at the pole and Tarik is thinking hard. Murderbot notes that Tarik looks angry but isn’t and how humans also have trouble controlling their facial expressions. Like it has a whole monologue about it. And then Tarik says “uhh why is there a drone in my face?” And ratthi said “ignore it”

Like that’s so funny. Murderbot is experiencing an epiphany about how it turns out constructs and humans aren’t all that different after all while also hovering a drone directly in front of Tarik’s face. And ratthi is like yea it does that anyway what were you saying?

This would be such a good scene to draw but perspective is the devil

[not-your-average-url]

“ART had wanted to go back to a show that we had watched … about early humans leaving their original system for the first time”

Something something art trying to influence murderbot to join it by showing media about leaving the place you call home for the first time something something parallels to murderbot fear of change and what leaving for arts mission would mean. Leaving preservation a second time after learning truths about yourself and coming to terms with personhood and being in an environment where you are loved and cherished is a very different thing than a journey to find yourself

[not-your-average-url]

[not-your-average-url]

Finished Network Effect again and I’m thinking about how not once (I don’t remember it happening in system collapse but I’m gonna relisten soon) does murderbot give out its name. Murderbots name is always something that is taken from it without its consent. The PresAux team know cause of Gurathin how Art and Three know because the killbot baby didn’t know it was a secret.

Something something names have power something something true name vs given name idk

Also Art left a kernel of itself in a place it knew murderbot would look from their teamwork on ravihyral, named it after the pseudonym murderbot used, and then set the password as its hard feed address. The secret name that only bots can use. Art addressed it by every name it knows and trusted in the capabilities it knew it had from their cold case solving.

I’m frothing at the mouth about them

[not-your-average-url]

[not-your-average-url]

I'm sure I'm not the first to think of this but I just got hit by a huge parallel in Network Effect

Early on, ART tells Murderbot, regarding Amena, "tell her you care for her. Human juveniles need to hear that from their caregivers" (paraphrasing here, i don't have the text in front of me)

Later, Ratthi insists that they show Murderbot the video surrounding its retrieval. Murderbot is absolutely astounded by all the effort gone into getting it back

Clearly juvenile humans aren't the only ones who need it spelled out

[not-your-average-url]

ART yelling at its crew to do their laundry because Murderbot's important person Dr Mensah is going to be onboard and it needs to make a good impression because it wants Mensah to approve of their 'relationship' and be okay with them 'moving in together', and then being so nice to Dr Mensah when it's been an overbearing, domineering, sarcastic nightmare the whole book is something that is so special to me

[not-your-average-url]

Okay okay so what if. What if you were a hyper-intelligent transport that does research on stars (and also super-secret anti-corporate espionage/action) and you care about your crew SO much. And then you meet a rogue SecUnit and it seems cool and you become friends and you help each other and you speedrun a deep friendship starting with media and threats. And then you don't see it for a while but that's okay. And the whole time you're apart it has a direct comm to you inside it next to its ribs. Which neither of you use but it's there.

And then you get attacked and your crew gets kidnapped and you only have time to save a copy of yourself and give the people attacking you a direction. So you direct the attackers towards your friend using the direct comm that it's been keeping in its chest because if anyone can fight them off and save you its the one.

And it does come and it does kill them and it finds your backup hidden in a file that you've password-protected specifically for it. With its secret name that only you call it and that the other people who love and care about it can't even pronounce. Can't even see. And it saves you while its literally falling apart because of course it does.

And then its saved you but its angry because you kidnapped it. And really its angry because in trying to save your humans you put its humans in danger. But you work so well together and you have to save your crew and you start talking to each other again (because it spent an hour ignoring you because now that you're both out of immediate danger it really is angry (but not as angry as it was when it thought you'd been killed)).

And while all this is happening the non-romantic, non-sexual relationship you two have is unquestionably taking the space where a romantic subplot would be in the novel you two are in. Dramatic saving, emotional breakdowns, fights, slow reconciliation and everything.

[not-your-average-url]

v.2

[not-your-average-url]

I can’t believe I come outta art block for this

[not-your-average-url]

I’ve genuinely teared up so many times relistening to network effect. Everyone loves and cares for murderbot and it’s just so sweet. I got to the part where they found the dead secunit and supposedly, art makes the humans ask why it died and murderbot has to explain the governor module. And it sucks and it doesn’t like talking about it and when it decides the conversation is done, ratthi tells everyone to drop it.

And earlier when art supports the humans endeavor to join murderbot and murderbot is like fuck you this is my job and art is like “I’ve already lost my crew. I refuse to lose you too” and the next line is Ameena saying its face did something weird.

YOU ARE LOVED. YOU ARE CHERISED

Screaming crying throwing up

“Thiago made a noise suspiciously like a derisive snort. ‘I wish I could. It doesn’t listen to me’

I listen to you plenty, Thiago”

MURDERBOT PLEAAASE

The audiobook has no right being this good. I love you Kevin R. Free

[not-your-average-url]

“I said ‘The humans think I’m an asshole. Wait till they get to know you.’

[ART said] ‘I thought you weren’t speaking to me’”

They’re so petty I love them.

[not-your-average-url]

SUPER GRAPHIC ULTRA MODERN MURDERBOT LIKE ME

This is not my first time committing this particular sin

[not-your-average-url]

Screaming crying throwing up

“Thiago made a noise suspiciously like a derisive snort. ‘I wish I could. It doesn’t listen to me’

I listen to you plenty, Thiago”

MURDERBOT PLEAAASE

The audiobook has no right being this good. I love you Kevin R. Free

[not-your-average-url]

"The Big Dipper as it is today (left) and as it will look in 50,000 years." Dream of stars. 1940.

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